1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to a device driver with a default setting that can be regulated separately from rights of users who use a computer including the device driver.
2. Description of the Related Art
The system administrators of the work place conventionally modify a printer driver as the device driver for suiting the users' environment in order that general users can use a printer as a device connected to a communication network. The printer driver is modified so as to regulate a function of the printer that the general users use according to their environment. Further, the modified printer driver is distributed to the general users by a recording medium or by installing the printer driver on a server in order to share the printer driver. Accordingly, the general users can use the printer by installing the printer driver on their respective computers.
On the other hand, when changing the function of the printer, it is necessary to modify the printer driver and direct the general users to reinstall the modified printer driver on their respective computers.
Referring to this, Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application Publication No.2003-330653 (hereinafter, referred to as Patent Document 1) discloses a printer driver enabling only the users having administrator rights to perform a default setting of the printer driver or enabling even general users to perform the default setting of the printer driver without reinstalling the modified printer driver. It should be noted that the default setting of the printer driver is to select an attribute value of the function of the printer to be used corresponding to the printer driver in advance.
However, the printer driver disclosed by Patent Document 1 cannot regulate the default setting of the printer driver separately from the right of the users who use the computers. Accordingly, in the above described computers, the users having the administrator rights such as “administrator”, “root” and the like can consequently change the default setting of the printer driver freely. For example, in notebook PCs (personal computers) which general users personally own, there are many cases where the general users have administrator rights. Therefore, the general users can change the default setting of the above described printer driver freely. In order to prevent this, it is necessary for the system administrators of the work place to install the printer driver regulating the function of the printer which the general users use on each of the above notebook PCs.
Referring to this, Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application Publication No.2003-216374 (hereinafter, referred to as Patent Document 2) discloses a printer driver locking a user interface for performing the default setting of the printer driver by a predetermined locking file.
However, in the printer driver disclosed in Patent Document 2, when the shared printer driver stored in the server is installed on the computers which the users use, the locking file is not installed on the computers which the general users use. Since the locking file is different from a general setup information file storing setup information of the printer driver, an OS (operating system) of the server does not recognize the locking file as an indispensable file for the printer driver. Accordingly, the default setting of the printer driver of the server cannot be directly used by the computers which the general users use.